Read Online The Devil’s Share by Wallace Stroby - Free Book Online Page B

side to get the cell phone. It would have his number in it. Even though he’d called from a burner, he didn’t want to leave any connection behind. He put the phone with the money.
    He used a dirty T-shirt from the breakfast nook to wipe down everything he’d touched. Then he went into the kitchenette, opened the cabinet beneath the stove, and found what he was looking for, the two propane lines coming in from the outside tanks.
    Using the T-shirt, he opened drawers, found a pair of pliers in the second one, mixed in with silverware, pens, and small tools. He started to shut the drawer again, saw the edge of the black box stuck in the back. He drew it out, knowing already what it was. He lifted the lid, and inside on a bed of cotton was Greggs’s Silver Star, on a red, white, and blue ribbon.
    He looked at the medal, then back at Greggs, set the box on the counter.
    There was no time to search the camper, see if he’d left notes, a journal. It was time to finish this.
    He left two windows partially open for oxygen, closed the rest, then knelt in front of the stove. With the T-shirt covering the pliers’ teeth to prevent sparks, he unscrewed the propane lines. Gas began to hiss into the kitchenette, the smell of the odorant making his eyes water.
    There was a small toaster oven on the counter. He unplugged it and carried it into the bedroom at the far end of the camper, holding his breath against the gas. Just a mattress on the floor here, tangled sheets, scattered clothes. He set the oven on the floor, then ripped the T-shirt in half and shoved part of it inside, pushing it up against the coils. He plugged the cord into a wall socket, turned the dial to its highest setting, wiped down what he’d touched. The oven began to hum.
    He closed the bedroom door to give himself more time, got the ice pick from the sink, and left the camper. Shutting the door tightly behind him, he wiped the outside latch clean, then went down the steps.
    There was a single light still on in the house. Sharon waiting up to hear from him. He hadn’t wanted it like this, but there was no other way. And he’d have to be quick, before the camper went up.
    He held the ice pick down at his side, shoved the torn T-shirt into his jacket pocket. He would need it. As he started up the driveway, the dog began to bark.

 
    SEVEN
    Crissa steered the rental car to the side of the road, looked off into the empty desert, heat haze rising, and thought, This is the place.
    She got out of the car, taking the binoculars with her. Only forty-five minutes from Las Vegas, the city already out of sight behind the hills. In the distance, snowcapped mountains, but here, only an endless stretch of parched red earth, strewn with boulders.
    She’d driven another twenty miles south, still scouting, but hadn’t found a better place, so she’d turned around, come back. The land here was mostly flat, but on the other side of the road was an arroyo that ran parallel to the highway. No guardrail, and ten feet deep at least.
    On this side was a scattering of rocks, the largest about twelve feet high and twenty feet wide. High-tension lines in the far distance, and about two hundred yards past the rocks a single cell tower, maybe a hundred and fifty feet high, bristling with antennae at different levels. There was a cluster of equipment cabinets in an enclosure at its base, surrounded by a high chain-link fence topped with razor wire.
    She wore a black pullover, jeans, and boots, and the heat was a shock after the air-conditioning in the car. From Texas, she’d flown directly to Vegas, picked up the rental. Standing out here now, in the middle of this emptiness, she felt for the first time that it was all real, that it might work.
    She heard a distant thrum, looked north and saw a dark shape coming down the road, seeming to rise and fall in the blacktop haze. A tractor-trailer, moving fast. She walked back to the wide boulder. It